habitat, and the perceived sense of social security, with much of the emphasis on
economic growth. It is possible that some kinds of project will lead to an overall
decline in material wellbeing (for example the economically regressive features of
someunemployment, social investment and ‘trading enterprise’ schemes); and/or
degradation of the habitat (for example, resource degradation or depletion); and,
or also, social discord (for example, schemes that make presumptive decisions
about who should be enskilled and who should not, and what they should be
enskilled about).
One pragmatic emphasis for project generation is to extract positive support
from government and local government sources. It is by means of promotional
outreach and direct project propagation that growth needs are addressed, and
direct actions and projects for growth are pursued and managed. This is a com-
petitive, inwardly focused, within-region, process.A question arises about the reasons for exploring the possibilities for development- and to a lesser extent conservancy – via project generation. Simply put, projects
do not propagate themselves, nor are they necessarily positive. Generating a
development and conservancy project inventory through the use of an ‘ideas
nudge list’ is one way to start. This links on to suggest the utility of ‘brainstorm-
ing’ with all ideas received and considered openly in an atmosphere of mutual
trust. The participants would include regional development and conservancy spe-
cialists,andeducators, administrators, and executives in industry and commerce,
involving a greater variety of specialists than the orthodox planner-economist-
lawyer trio. Teamwork is clearly the combination-key to success, and the role of
leadership is hugely significant within any team, described, at its most aggressive,
as ‘hard business networking’. Specialists are either directly engaged or consulted,
and can include urbanists, statisticians and analysts, administrators, engineering
architectural surveying and landscaping professionals, agronomists, pastoralists,
silviculturists, hydrologists and other resource specialists, social workers and
political analysts, education and health service advisers, geographer specialists,
and civil-defence safety and security advisers. The difficult task for leaders of
growth management teams is to keep focused on the ‘multipliers’ which will
improve their region’s export returns, while adding residentiary jobs to the
production–consumption multiplier spiral (figure 4.1). The initial brainstorming
search is for intervention opportunities, there being no established rubric; no
concept is treated as absurd.
Economic development and resource conservancy agencies, and the project
promotions they engage in, are a potent medium for political grandstanding.
Nevertheless a political profile has to be identified as a component part of most
economic development and resource conservancy projects. Indeed Levy’s dictum
(1990: Ch. 8) that ‘selling is the single most important activity of most develop-
ment (and conservationist) planners’ suggests a reliance on political champions
to identify with both economic development and resource conservancy case by
case.
An operational dilemma which arises is how the planning practitioner engages
and encourages political involvement. This comes into profile because most gen-
134 Practice